Animation

When most people think of The Transformers, they are thinking of the animated series that ran from 1984 to 1987, along with the 1986 movie that changed a lot about the setting. Although there was a slightly different Marvel comic continuity running in parallel, the animated series appears to be more widely-known. For a lot of folks who were kids during the 80s, it is one of the biggest cultural referents we have - there's a going joke/observation that if you find somebody of the right age and subculture, odds are very, very good that they'll have a vivid memory of being affected strongly by Optimus Prime's death in the animated movie.

It is the animated series that form the inspiration for the 2007 film, both in general plot (Earth as an otherwise-unimportant battleground for the Transformers) and in the list of characters. To a lesser extent, characterization is also brought over. Starscream's perpetual treachery, Bumblebee's connection with humans and Ironhide's "cowboy" temperament are generally associated so strongly with those characters that it would be difficult to imagine them any other way.

The series is broadly divided into pre-movie (seasons 1 and 2) and post-movie (seasons 3 and 4) because the movie reformatted a few characters, killed many, many more and changed the scope of the action from being predominantly on Earth to the wider field of space. Without characters like Optimus Prime, Megatron and Starscream, it's fairly easy to mistake the second period for a spin-off if you're not familiar with the larger plot.